In project management, there is great interest in attempting to predict the behavioral intentions of stakeholder groups.
Stakeholders groups may include people, parties, companies and any entity that may have an interest, may be affected by, or may have an interest on a project. Some examples of stakeholders may include customers/members, shareholders, suppliers, referral sources, distribution partners, financiers, government, labor unions, communities, employees and other workgroups, units, functional areas, departments, etc.
Given that stakeholders are affected by and can significantly affect a project, the complex process of initiating, developing and maintaining stakeholder relationships in a coordinated and timely manner is, in many cases, vital to the relative success and sustainability of projects. Unfortunately, tools available in the art have failed to keep up with the changing nature of many projects.
There is a need for reliable adaptive systems able to predict stakeholder behaviors to facilitate the creation of successful stakeholder policies.